Linwood Barclay - The Twenty-Three

“I was there.”

“I know . So you see what I’m saying? I’m not worrying for nothing.” The man’s voice was breaking. “There was a time, maybe, when I was able to handle this kind of stuff. But not anymore. I feel helpless. I want to help her, but I don’t know what to do.”

Cal closed his eyes, leaned his head up against the headrest, thought of Crystal. Until her father showed up, she was his responsibility. He couldn’t go charging off to help this Harwood guy find Sam. Not now.

“You said you’ve been to the house?”

“Yes,” David said quickly, sounding encouraged that Weaver was taking the time to ask questions.

“See if you can get inside, see if-”

“I did that. It looked like they’d packed up.”

“What did the neighbors say?”

David didn’t answer right away. “Shit,” he said finally. “I didn’t even talk to them.”

“Start there,” Cal said. “Let me know how it goes.”

He felt bad, ending the call, but there was only so much he could deal with. He’d promised Crystal he wouldn’t be long. Right now, he believed she needed him more than Harwood did. David had reason to be concerned about Samantha and her son, Cal knew, but he also knew Sam was no fool. If she’d heard her ex-husband was on the loose, then she’d have done what she had to do and gotten out of town.

Cal hoped David was wrong in thinking Sam wasn’t answering her cell because Brandon had already found her. But hadn’t Harwood been a reporter once? Cal recalled hearing that he was. So let him nose around, use the same basic skills Cal would have employed.

Cal turned on the engine. It was time to check out of his hotel. Before long, he was at a T intersection, about to make a right, when he saw a familiar vehicle approaching from the south.

It was Dwayne, in his pickup truck.

Cal’s brother-in-law blew past, Dwayne’s focus on the road ahead. He never glanced in Cal’s direction, didn’t notice the car.

Cal wasn’t sure what made him decide to turn left, in the opposite direction of the hotel.

He told himself he wasn’t actually following his brother-in-law. Not in any surveillance kind of way. It wasn’t as though he’d set out this afternoon to tail Dwayne.

It just happened.

Dwayne drove by, and Cal decided to see where he might be going. Told himself that if Dwayne pulled off the road to go into a 7-Eleven to buy a Slim Jim, he might just follow him in, strike up a conversation, see how the guy was doing. Maybe see if he wanted to go for a beer.

Tell him something like, “Look, I’m sorry that little girl and I have crashed at your place, but I really appreciate it, and we’re going to get out of your hair as soon as possible.”

Yeah. Maybe something like that.

Cal told himself he was definitely not following his brother-in-law even though Celeste was worried he might be seeing another woman. Was that something Cal really wanted to stick his nose into? Okay, maybe a little . This was his sister they were talking about. You go messing around on my sister and that’s likely to piss me off.

But then again, they were all adults. And if there was one thing Cal had learned from his years working with the police and as a private investigator, there were usually two sides to every story. He hadn’t heard Dwayne’s. Maybe he had some serious complaints about Celeste, and maybe he didn’t. It was possible whatever story Dwayne had to tell was bullshit.

Maybe whatever problems there were in his marriage were one hundred percent his fault.

Cal wasn’t sure he wanted to know. He had no wish to be mediator. If their marriage was in trouble, they should talk to a marriage counselor.

Cal had enough problems of his own to work through without taking on anyone else’s.

Except for Crystal’s, of course.

He’d look after her until her father showed up. If he showed up. If he was honest with himself, he’d admit that he was hoping Crystal’s father would take his time getting here.

Cal liked Crystal. He found her quirkiness endearing, even challenging in a way, and there was a mix of vulnerability and toughness about her. Maybe his feelings had something to do with losing his son. There was a part of him that yearned to care for someone, to-

Dwayne made a turn. He was heading downtown.

Cal decided to stick with him. But he held back, keeping at least one other car between himself and Dwayne. The kind of thing he did when he did have someone under surveillance.

Okay, he thought, so maybe I am following him. Just for a few blocks.

If he did see Dwayne meeting another woman, what would he do then? Reach under the seat for his camera with the telephoto lens? Show the shots to his sister? Unlikely. But he might, just might, take Dwayne aside at that point. Tell him he knew. Tell him to get his fucking house in order.

Once they were well into the business district, the truck’s brake lights came on. Then the right blinker. Dwayne rolled the truck over to the curb, killed the engine.

Cal drove on, eyes forward.

He checked the passenger door mirror, saw Dwayne get out of the truck and cross the street. Once on the other side, he walked in the same direction Cal had been driving. Cal saw an open spot at the curb and wheeled into it, sat there and waited for Dwayne to come up parallel to him on the opposite side of the street.

Dwayne slowed as he neared a bar, Cal thinking he was going to go inside. But instead, Dwayne disappeared into a narrow alleyway between the bar and a shoe store.

“What the hell?” Cal said.

He had to ease the car ahead a length to get a better view down the alley. Dwayne was heading in from the street, and another man was approaching from the back. They stopped in the middle.

Cal settled back in his seat and reached under the passenger seat from behind. He pulled out the camera with the telephoto lens. The one he often used when he was doing work like this for hire.

It wasn’t so much that he wanted to take a picture. But the camera was as good as, or better than, a pair of binoculars.

He quickly wrestled the camera out of its case, took the lens cap off, and brought the camera to eye level.

The guy meeting Dwayne was mid-forties, short, about 250 pounds. Jeans and a black Windbreaker.

They were talking.

Nodding.

Then the other guy reached into his pocket, handed something to Dwayne.

Click.

It was just reflex, hitting the shutter button when he did. Because if this were a real job, this might be evidence of something. Of money changing hands. A thick wad of it, too, it looked like to Cal.

GILLPickens was faceup on a gurney that hugged the wall in a hallway some distance from the emergency ward, somewhere between radiology and the cafeteria, but he was not alone. The ER, and the adjoining examining rooms, had not been able to accommodate the huge influx of patients, and there was no space in any of the hospital rooms, so the spillover had left the sick languishing throughout the building. Patients lined both sides of the hallway, which resulted in a lot of shifting and squeezing as staff and family members jockeyed for position.

So when Marla, with Arlene Harwood at her side and Matthew in her arms, finally had an opportunity to talk with Dr. Clara Moorehouse about her father’s condition, there was little in the way of privacy. The discussion was held at Gill’s side. His skin looked like concrete and his eyes were closed, but he was alive.

“Surely you can find a room for him somewhere instead of dumping him here,” Arlene said.

“We’re doing the best we can,” Moorehouse said.